General Junk

For those of you that aren’t in the affected areas – here’s the skinny on what’s going on.

Time Warner Cable has finished it’s contract with Fox Broadcasting and it’s time to renew. This time around Fox is asking for some compensation for their local affiliates: about $1 per subscriber. Now Time Warner is willing to pay a fee but it’s looking at more like 20cents per subscriber (something closer to what they pay for CBS affiliates). An agreement could not be reached so Time Warner decided to play hard ball and start a big PR campaign to go after the “greedy broadcaster”

Here’s a better explanation from WSJ…

They asked the public whether we wanted TWC to “Get Tough” with the broadcasters or “Roll Over”. Of course, the results of such poll was never going to affect the negotiations. It was a BS campaign. Even if you select “Roll Over” they give you “another chance” to make the correct decision. It’s like, “We hear you, but we’re going to get tough for you”

Not to be out gunned, Fox came back with their own PR campaign to blame the “greedy cable supplier”

Fox is saying that TWC is just using this as excuse to raise cable rates and that the evil corporation that brings in billions is being stingy with money.

And caught in the middle – the hostage of January premieres including the premiere of American Idol, January Bowl Games, and the return of popular hit shows like House, Simpsons, and Glee.

So who’s right? They’re both full of it. Honestly I would be more on the side of Fox – costs are costs. Besides, I have no great love affair with TWC – my experience with them on their cable media side hasn’t shown me that it is a particular well run company.

In reality, this is negotiation is far more complicated than just who’s making more money. Just saw this article from B&C about taking Fox to the FCC. I can’t proclaim to understand really what’s going on, but it sounds like TWC struck a deal with Sinclair which owns several Fox affiliates. So they’re claiming Fox Broadcasting is butting in with affiliate’s retransmit negotiations with the cable suppliers which may be a violation of FCC rules.

Or something like that.

And as a heavy viewer of Fox myself, I have a dog in the fight.

What I do know – once this is all settled, both sides are going to be winners. I predict TWC will be forced to raise rates and Fox Broadcasting will get a raise in fee. TWC will blame Fox but I really don’t think anyone will pay attention.

It’s definitely NOT in the best interest of either side to pull the Fox signal from TWC. From Fox’s standpoint, it means the loss of millions of viewers. From TWC, it’s a could mean loss of millions of subscribers. I have a sneaking suspicion a deal will be struck at 11th hour with both sides emerging declaring victory for the little guy. But its really the giants battling over who gets what part of the carcass that is the cable subscriber.

I sound like an evil anti-corporate person right now… I’m not, but I don’t like to pretend that corporations are watching my back. Nobody watches your back. Not big business, big government, or big union. They’re all out from for themselves.

But I digress. I really doubt we’ll see Fox disappear from the lineup. I could be wrong though but I would put the odds at 5 to 1.

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So little time – because I’m doing projects like this…
Enjoy!

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Okay so I’m taking on some small things right now.

I don’t want to jump on the economic bandwagon and say how terrible things are right now because of the credit crisis – it’s just an excuse.

Anyhow, working on this photo montage – I’ve got the timer set. Let’s see if I can wrap it up in about 3-4 hours.

Nearly 300 photos in 3 hours – let’s see.

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